Paying up

MONTREAL – Youppi! hit the streets of Montreal over the weekend to make good on a bet with Jimmy Fallon.

On May 16, the night before Game 1 of the Eastern Conference final series between the Canadiens and Rangers, the Habs and the host of The Tonight Show came to terms on a friendly wager. If the Canadiens won the series, Fallon, who tapes his show in Studio 6B at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in New York, would wear a Habs jersey during one of his opening monologues. If the Rangers came out on top, the Canadiens would change the @CanadiensMTL avatar to a photo of Fallon’s choosing for a day and the team’s mascot, Youppi!, would take 10 photos in a Rangers jersey in front of various Montreal landmarks and post them to Twitter.

Oh, and Fallon had one last specification for the photoshoot:

A mascot of his word, Youppi! set out a few days after the Canadiens’ series-ending loss in Game 6 to the Blueshirts to start snapping shots in his custom-made Fallon #1 Rangers jersey. Receiving plenty of hugs and encouragement from fans along the way, the disappointed mascot started his day outside the Bell Centre and ended it, as promised, by riding the mechanical bull at Chez Serge, on Boulevard Saint-Laurent.